Chiaroscuro
by BiteMarks
Summary: What does true love mean? When something happens, something terrible, Mick finds himself having to answer this question and make a difficult, life changing decision.
1. Chapter 1

_**Chiaro/**__scuro_

_._

The woman rose from the surface of the sea and slicked back her short blonde hair. She was beautiful, breathtaking in the way that only young women can be, effortlessly, and without the least hint of vanity or self-consciousness. The million tiny droplets clinging to her skin and hair and eyelashes sparkled like gemstones in the sunlight as she rolled within the gentle swell. She looked as if she belonged to the sea; a fey creature trapped in diamond netting, doomed never to return to her home within its depths.

The warmth of the sun on the crown of her head filled her with joy and her lips parted, tilting upwards, before with a deep breath, she dived back down again and headed in to shore.

...

Deep within the shadows of the Norfolk pines that separated the sea from the long row of terraced cafes beyond, a man sat toying idly with a cold cup of coffee, the occasional ray of sun flaring from the edge of the heavy white gold ring on his forefinger. The casual observer never noticed him sitting way back there in the shade, baseball cap jammed low over his forehead, long black overcoat thrown over his white tee, heavy boots on his feet in place of sandals, which was perhaps the way the man preferred it. Certainly the throngs of holidaymakers darting past him like schools of tropical fish in their brightly coloured summer shorts and singlets never paused for long enough to pay attention to the unusual tourist two tables over. If ever someone did look his way, the gaze slid over him like a waxed surfboard over waves, slick and rapid, leaving no mark in it's passing nor making any demand. The only witnesses who acknowledged or cared about his presence were the café's young waitresses who took orders, sponged tables and wondered idly amongst themselves about the handsome, brooding loner at the back, their hearts and eyelashes fluttering, imagining his strong working man's hands on their thighs or pointed breasts as they went about their work, each secretly harbouring the futile hope that one morning he might look their way.

If the man noticed, he gave no sign of it. He saw only the sea and the sand, and not even the girls whose eyes devoured him observed that it was neither the beauty of the scenery nor the passing tableau of humanity on the beach and in the water that so mesmerised him. He was watching the woman.

It had taken him quite some time and effort to find her and there were days that he despaired, her disappearance had been so complete. He studied the girl as she surfaced near shore and strode confidently through the waves and up onto dry land. Her hair was short, much shorter than she'd ever worn it back in L.A, and she'd allowed the natural wave full sway. The white scraps of fabric clinging to her form left little to the imagination and his eyebrows drew together in a concerned frown. She was thinner, too thin. Perhaps it was just the golden hue of her all over tan that had the slimming effect, but he didn't think so. She had always been a slender girl, but where once her arms and legs were soft and rounded, a welcoming haven after a long and tiring evening, her limbs now had the lean, toned and wiry look of too little food and too much physical labour.

He ran a hand over his stubbled jaw and not for the first time that week wondered what had happened to his wife.

...

Mick had searched high and low for Beth for sixteen months. It was ironic, really, that when at last he'd finally found her, it had been at the other end of the earth. Literally.

Sydney reminded him of L.A.: the heat, the high rollers, that particular glamorous sheen only ever present in those few locations in the world where awe-inspiring landscape intersected with ever-lasting sunshine and tax exempt expense accounts. He grimaced and shaded his eyes as a particularly strong shaft of sunlight flashed across his face. The sun seemed so much brighter and hotter here, and with a grimace, he wondered if its intensity had played a part in Beth's decision to make a home here.

He watched from the other side of the street as she towelled herself dry, the admiring glances of the early morning surfers unmistakeable to his keen vampire eyesight. He clenched his fist, biting down on the desire to sweep in and wrap her into something more befitting his wife – a neck to knee caftan or suit of medieval armour perhaps. She draped a sarong casually around her waist, leaned down and picked up her beach bag, stuffed her towel inside then threw it over her shoulder and moved up onto the boardwalk, heading away from Mick's position directly opposite.

He sat and watched her go. There was no need to follow. He'd been around long enough by now to know her daily routine. It was time for him to head home and catch some freezer time. Tonight, as always, he'd be at his usual post, in the dark, watching over her. Even though she no longer wanted him, he'd promised himself that he wouldn't relinquish his guardianship of her until another man, a human this time, took his place.

He owed her that much.

...

The dead don't dream, they certainly don't have nightmares - at least, that's what Josef always said. That archaic vampire truism never stopped him from seeing her face every night, though, as he slipped into the lingering oblivion that passed for sleep amongst his race. Sometimes it would be her voice he heard, just her voice, saying his name as if she were lying there still, close beside him in the dark the way she'd always been. It felt so real, no matter how often in the months since her departure he'd risen alone as the sun was setting and wiped worthless tears from beneath his frozen cheekbones.

In the beginning, he'd thought that particular version of his own private hell was the worst, but as time went by, he'd learned that darker phantasms than this waited within the void to persecute him. That morning, as he withdrew to the cold comfort of his glass coffin, a familiar apparition invaded his rest. Its horror existed not so much in the vision itself, but in the power it had to torment him with anguished remorse and twisted arousal wrenched from his unconscious…

… _it was Beth, his darling Beth, her blonde hair long and tousled and brushing against the rosy tips of her nipples, and she is beckoning to him, drawing him to her with cool, white arms, her lips gleaming in the firelight, her smile widening, her canines lengthening, lengthening…_

...

He always wakes in fright, wanting to be a little closer to her than is wise after enduring the daylight hours alone with only her terrible doppelganger for company. So he takes a table in the darkest corner, nursing his beer as if he'd never been turned, sucking at it sparingly the way an old man would, his eyes never leaving the slender blonde behind the bar. He knows he is safe, here in the darkest corner of the bar. She never busses tables, the licensee and patrons preferring to glimpse her navel or the tanned crescent of skin that peeps above the hem of her tiny shorts as she reaches high for bottles overhead.

He really shouldn't be this near, but after this morning's nightmare vision he can't bear to be one inch farther. He can breathe her in from here.

...

On her way home she stops under one of the halogen lights that guards the centre of the Corso and washes the area a watery industrial orange. She lifts a foot, examines the ropey sole of her sandshoe. Tonight, as every night, it's been a long shift, eight hours on her feet serving beers and stocking fridges and now there's a pebble under her heel. She bends to release the stone and as she does the edge of her top falls away and Mick can see the fine white scars near her shoulder, livid in the unearthly glow. He's not seen her wounds since the evening they occurred and the sight is vicious, hitting him like a high right hand jabbed up and into his diaphragm. He tried to choke back the gasp, but failed.

Who's there, she demanded, sounding braver than her heartbeat indicated.

The recessed doorway affords him no means to escape undetected and despite his pledge never to reveal himself, now that he's been discovered, he'd rather step out and face her disgust than have her find him skulking here, like the stalker, the _freak_, he's always felt himself to be.

Oh, it's you, she says, lowering both her handbag and her guard as he steps into the light. He can hear her heartbeat slowing, senses her fingertips loosening from around the can of mace he knows she always carries. Then miraculously she is smiling and as she walks toward him, he can see she's offering him her outstretched hand. The touch heats his blood, and for a second he's overjoyed, feeling a facsimile of life returning to his deadened limbs. But it's just his luck; the euphoria doesn't last long, evaporating rapidly as she smiles and says,

You're that cute guy who always sits right in back. Pleased-to-meet-you-Guy-from-Table-Twenty-three. My name is Susie, Susie Arlo.

...


	2. Chapter 2

**Title**: Chiaro/scuro

**Rating**: NC-17 for adult themes

**Pairing**: Mick /Beth

**A/N**: This was intended to be the last part of the story, but it seemed too long to post all once so I had to split it. The good news is that Part 3 is already written.

**Chiaro**/scuro - Part 2

.

Her announcement is like the shadow you see flickering at the edges of your vision, the emotional sucker punch you never see coming. He is simultaneously confused and dazed. He is sure his mouth would have hung open til sunrise had she not laughingly suggested that social interactions were usually reciprocal and that according to etiquette a gentleman would never keep a lady at a disadvantage by refusing to give his name.

She beamed at him, her face so untroubled by his familiarity that he extinguished at once the thought that she was merely being petty, pretending just to punish him for following her here. So he managed to hold it together, stifling enough of his apprehension to tell her carefully that his name is Michael and that he's here on holiday from the States. He walks her home on unsteady legs, happy to let her think that the shy boy from her homeland has left to return to his own bed after seeing her safely inside.

As she vanishes into the darkened stairwell, he decides that he has no choice, tonight he must breach two of his most inviolable rules: the first, never to enter her apartment, for surely it must contain a passport, a bank account, something that will enlighten him; and the second, never to involve Josef. He's borne enough of Josef's disapproval of the search for his errant wife in the last six months to last a mortal lifetime. Beth is an issue of contention between them and tonight he has no wish for another lecture. Nevertheless, when he does find what he is looking for, and he will, Josef may be able to provide the kind of assistance that only a lot of money and corruptible connections can manage.

Light spilled out of Beth's apartment window and as swift as nightfall, he is on the adjacent balcony, hugging the bare concrete of the building site opposite. She is confident, his beautiful wife, that from here she cannot be observed, for she never bothers to pull the shades. He savours these few moments alone with her every evening, here on his lonely eyrie. It is the only time she is completely his.

She pads around the tiny apartment, washing and re-shelving dishes left on the sink from her morning meal, flicking through a magazine, pulling a brush through her wavy crop as she prepares for bed. He berates himself for hardening as she steps naked from the shower, forcing himself back into guilty, white knuckled flaccidity. He's not here for that.

Finally, she reaches the same impasse she does every night, standing motionless in her bedroom doorway, eyeing her bed with a frown as if it were an opponent. She anticipates failure, because she reaches for a small cylinder, taps two white tablets onto her open palm, hesitates, shakes out another, then another and thrusts them into her mouth, tossing her head back and swallowing them without water in the practised motion of the habitual insomniac.

He'd thought her sleep difficulties were due to bad memories, but now he's not sure what to think. For if she doesn't remember her name or the husband who loves her, then what could she possibly recall of the rest of her past?

Regardless of its cause, tonight her insomnia will work in his favour. The tablets should sedate her until daybreak.

He watched her turn down the bed and climb under the sheets and waited while her heartbeat and breathing slowed, then with the lightness of a sparrow, he vaulted onto the opposite wall and up and onto her balcony. He stood a moment in the moonlight, then in one swift movement slid apart the glass doors sealing her bedroom and stepped inside.

.

...

_He closed the door behind him. The gleam in her eye meant trouble, but tonight he didn't care. He couldn't think straight, could never think straight when she looked at him like that, lying in his bed, all silken limbs and sharp nipples beneath the blood-red satin of her nightgown. He could see the shadow of her bush beneath the fabric, wanted to hook his thumbs underneath the hem, push it high around her thighs and breathe in her salty aroma so badly that his hands were shaking._

_He knew from her look of triumph that his eyes had silvered. He forced the irises back to grey and retracted his fangs with a grunt. She made a little moue, but drew him to her anyway, pressing herself between his muscled forearms and kissing him with the wanton abandon of the French whores of his youth._

_._

_..._

Mick closed his eyes, lightheaded. He'd almost forgotten how fragrant she was, the intoxicating warmth of her aroma overwhelming in the cosy bedroom. Standing there over her bed, all he wanted to do was sink down beside her, mould himself to her contours and surrender to the kaleidoscopic wonder of her scent. He shook his head, blurring the images of her until they faded. He'd need to have a care his yearning didn't give him cause to stay longer than was strictly necessary. He was only here to do a job.

He began with the tallboy in the corner, pulling out the lowest drawer first then working his way up in the efficient manner of a professional thief. He supposed that's what she'd think he was if she woke to find him here rifling through her belongings. The search was swift and silent and he closed the final drawer with a sense of deflation. This girl, this 'Susie' lived simply, her drawers containing nothing but cheap white tees, candy coloured cotton skirts and underwear, not the expensive tailoring his Beth preferred. Her wardrobe confirmed his suspicions, more simple cotton clothing. Was there nothing left of his wife? He swivelled his gaze, hands on hips, considering his next step. He started for the door leading to the living room, but hesitated after only a few steps. A nagging sense he'd learned to trust rooted him to the spot, and he turned and reassessed the tallboy with narrowed eyes. In a second he'd sunk to his knees and removed the bottom-most drawer. He reached in, almost immediately feeling the touch of silk against his palm.

Mick's throat tightened. There between his fingers was the Hermes scarf he'd woven into Beth's hair as she lay there in the hospital. Its ends were knotted to create a loop and twirling slowly from its centre was her wedding ring.

.

...

_A promise is a promise, Mick._

_Beth, I don't know if I'm.._

_Shh… she said, shh, pressing a finger to his lips. You're ready._

_Beth, he whispered urgently, I don't want to.._

_..I know. You won't._

_He heard the metallic clinking before he recognised the two steel circles swinging from her forefinger. Amused and alarmed, his eyebrow rose. His clever girl had thought of everything. He supposed he'd have to ask Josef to speak to his freshies about that._

_Really?, was all he said, as if the idea wasn't worth considering._

_Would you even attempt to do it without them?_

_She'd already known that he wouldn't._

_The first band snicked shut around his wrist and as the final link ratcheted into place, holding his arms in place above his head as he lay prone against the coverlet, the atmosphere thickened, coagulating into an air of dangerous fervour that permeated the candlelit room in sweet heady waves like burnt sandalwood. The intensity heated his blood, made Beth's eyes gleam like sugared sapphires in the flickering gloom of their bedchamber._

_She squeezed his erection through the denim of his jeans. Already the beast was pressing at his edges and he rattled the cuffs, testing the limits of the toughened steel against the bars of his bed head. Her mouth grazed against his Adam's apple, kissed along his jaw. Her tongue curled around his earlobe, the white edges of her teeth pressing against the fleshy lobe. Just before biting down she whispered to him, words that made him shiver._

_._

_..._

He replaced the scarf with shaking hands, taking a moment to compose himself before standing and scanning the room. There, on the bookshelf in the corner, crumpled into a rectangular heap is a cheap canvas duffel bag. Although it clearly isn't carrying anything of bulk, he can feel that something is inside. He unzips the bag, feels a mass of shifting papers, and in his eagerness to know the truth upends the carrier bag onto the wooden boards beneath him.

Beth's past floats down and around him like oversize confetti.

_._

_..._

_It was an eruption, a veritable geyser of shiny buttons bouncing from the wall and dresser, cascading in crazy rivulets from bed to floor._

_Tonight's the night, Mick, she whispered, the ends of his shirttails still bunched tight within her grip. Let yourself go._

_Her hand fumbled at his buckle, fingers catching at the wiry hair beneath the denim. He groaned as the zipper lowered and she encircled him._

_You know you want to._

_Of course he did. Of course he wanted to, to his eternal shame, but this wasn't just some simple sex game stopped by a safe word amongst equals, and as the rhythm of her hand increased, he bargained with himself, promising he'd draw the line tonight no matter what Beth said. He groaned as her thumb lubricated the tip of his glans with its own clear liquid, and lust darkened grey eyes locked onto cornflower blues. He loved her so very, very much. Even shackled as he was, every sinew strained to touch her, his body twisting on its axis, following her hand as a bloom does the sun, unthinkingly, adoringly. Oh, how he wanted to tangle his hands in her hair, plunge the hard length of him inside her, merge his entire being with her! The pressure in his groin and gums was building, aching for the sweet release of penetration and he wanted something more, something deeper, more profound with her, one body, one soul. One blood._

_He had to taste her._

_His eyes silvered. Let me touch you._

_She smiled then, prolonging his agony, and took her time as she slid up his body, pushing a strap from her shoulder, releasing one perfect breast. She leaned over him, a nipple dangling between his open lips. He suckled eagerly, his need for oral satisfaction sated temporarily. Only super human discipline had kept his fangs safely sheathed, but he knew her well enough to know that she wouldn't let it rest there. After all, they'd agreed. Their first anniversary he would put aside his fears and consummate their marriage, Vampire style._

_Her cool fingers soothed the chafing at his wrists and in a voice so tender it almost made him weep she said, Let go, Mick. I've got you this time._

_Her trust was his undoing. Grey, silver, human, vampire, in ninety years he'd only ever been one or the other while making love with a wife. He'd never had to hold himself in check with Coraline. Was it even possible to leap into the chasm while keeping one foot on the precipice?_

_Beth was ablaze, her skin radiating heat like a furnace, and he was burning, burning, burning under her touch. She whispered to him, using words that would ordinarily make her blush, expressing her deepest desires. He teetered on the brink, the rising flames threatening to overwhelm him, and looked into the abyss: her love and vulnerability, his devouring need. He clenched his teeth and fought, fought hard to deny the emergence of his demon, his terror overtaking him at the last, as he'd suspected it would._

_Damn you, Mick, she whispered. When will you understand? I love you, all of you, the Vampire and the Man._

_Her hand slipped under the pillow and as it emerged he felt a series of sharp stings, and then he was gone, his mind blank, his body rigid, hips raised and belly clenched. He bellowed, a great roaring growl of unadulterated ecstasy and his fangs punched through his gums, filling his mouth with blood. He barely had time to register the long red scratches already healing along his side, or the metallic gleam of thimble-like caps on her fingers with tips like elongated fingernails, before he was lost, launched into the stratosphere again as his wife raked the Ponto-Obrigado, the ancient pleasure spikes used by human courtesans for centuries to gratify their vampire masters, lightly across his chest._

_The world spun and kept on spinning; the only light within his attention's narrow tunnel the flickering candle flame reflected in the curve of her lower lip. He knew nothing but his cavernous desire for her, and twined a leg around hers and pinned her to the bed. The pounding crescendo of her heartbeat deafened him and he growled and buried his face within her hollows, her neck, her breasts, anywhere her scent was strongest. Her body, such sweet, sweet temptation, shook beneath him, and in a low urgent voice she said that she trusted him and she raised her hand and drew the spikes across his naked back._

_The chain link binding the cuffs snapped in two. He smoothed rich handfuls of her golden hair away from her neck, the cold white tips of his fangs resting against her wildly jerking pulse._

_She held his face between her palms and nodded._

_._

_..._


	3. Chapter 3

**Title: Chiaro**/scuro

**Rating**:NC-17 for adult themes

**Pairing: **Mick /Beth

**Disclaimer**:Not mine, never mine.

.

_**Chiaro**/scuro - Part 3_

.

Previously -

_The chain link binding the cuffs snapped in two and he smoothed rich handfuls of her golden hair away from her neck, watching her with inhuman intensity as the cold white tips of his fangs rested against her wildly jerking pulse._

_She held his face between her palms and begged him. _

.

...

_Just before the thought 'I understand now' formed fully in his mind the boundaries dissolve and he plunges vast and formless into the all-encompassing cosmos He is all of it it's velvet dark and incandescent whirling nebulae an all-seeing all-comprehending consciousness inflating in a blissful sense of one-ness and belonging He is not alone no longer all alone in the alabaster prison of his skin for he is at once both himself and his beloved her every thought his, every mounting breath of her ecstasy not mirroring but becoming his own, rising and expanding until the smouldering rapture catches flame and can no longer be contained and he roars and falls helplessly into the abyss… _

...

When he uncurled his fists, the eight red crescents sliced into his palms were already healing. Scattered all around him was the detritus of Beth's life without him. There are rent receipts, movie stubs and uncompleted applications for library cards, and tickets, many tickets. Every scrap of paper tells a story, but it is the tickets that hold his attention: bus tickets, train tickets, and they are always heading east, east and away from him. A second of acute grief rose up and threatened to engulf him. As he clenched his jaw, squeezing the feeling down, a wad of glossy blue paper, now dog-eared and dirty and folded in two, caught his gaze. He felt a chill. It was a patient information brochure and it had her name on it, her new name. He inserted a thumbnail between the folds and lifted an edge. The Stillwater Neuropsychiatric Institute. Beth had been in a psychiatric hospital.

He didn't hesitate, pulled out his phone and punched in the number.

I found her.

White noise sounding vaguely like the ocean murmured softly across the wireless connection.

She doesn't remember me, Josef.

It was a long while before Josef spoke.

It's called a psychogenic fugue, Mick. It's a rare dissociative disorder that results in acute amnesia. Sufferers forget everything, their names, their jobs, their spouses, where they live, their entire identity. It's not unusual for them to travel, end up in other cities, start new lives.

When the sickening roaring in his head had ceased, all Mick could feel was rage.

You knew?

Josef sighed.

My investigators found her in Reno two months later, waiting tables and calling herself Susan Arlo. You remember sweet little Nurse Susie from the recovery unit, Mick - pretty blonde girl about Beth's height? The third time I asked them nicely to go back and start from the beginning they discovered that her ID had gone missing the day Beth left the hospital.

Mick was shaking. You didn't tell me? Why didn't you tell, me? His voice rose. I thought she'd left me. That she hated me, would never forgive me. Now you're saying she's been out there sick and alone for over a year?

You have to understand, Mick, there was nothing I could do. Nothing. I flew over to see her after my people had her admitted to a private psychiatric hospital. She didn't know me, didn't recognise your photograph, didn't understand why she was being detained there against her will. He paused and his voice lowered. My involvement more than distressed her.

Mick had a vision of Beth crying and hysterical, and he felt silently grateful that Josef had understated whatever had happened there. Josef was quiet for a moment, as if dealing with his own memories. When he continued, he sounded sad.

The doctors told me that physically she was fine, but that the psychological damage was extensive. Oh there was good news; the memory loss was reversible. But the bad news was that her recovery was unpredictable. Her memory would either come back on its own in time or it wouldn't. Period. They were adamant that any attempt to force the issue would have harmed her psychologically, perhaps sealed her mind forever.

Damn it, Josef, I'm her husband. I had a right to know.

If you'd known would you have left it alone to allow her mind the time it needed to heal itself? Would you have let her walk away?

Mick's silence was answer enough.

Josef's voice lowered. Mick… _Brother_… I didn't want you to lose the one small chance you had.

Josef, I've been… - Mick stopped, his grief something real and tangible, filling his chest cavity and constricting the passage of air across his vocal cords. He gasped - ...you know I've been…

Josef interrupted with a tenderness that Mick had never heard from him before.

Why do you suppose I let you go on thinking she left because she despised you?

Mick's eyes glazed over, and in his head all he could hear was the awful screaming silence…

.

...

_He can only compare the sensation to the disorienting after-effects of high-grade opium, a pleasant heavy lethargy that clouds the mind and encumbers the limbs with so much indolent satisfaction that surfacing is an effort. He can't be sure exactly when the last of Beth's cries had died away, only that the rhapsody of her tone had mirrored his, and that for one perfect moment in time the two of them were weightless, boundary-less and suspended in perfect unity. Toward the last her body had bucked against his, trembling violently in the onslaught of their climax. He sighed, lowering his elbows, relaxing the full measure of his weight onto her, wishing he could remain within her for a moment longer. For the very first time he feels an infinitesimal flicker of regret that she is merely human and that her limited mortal senses will forever bar her from the paradise his heightened senses have just experienced. He kissed her cheek, pushed aside a sweat soaked wisp of her hair. She was sleeping, worn out, by the sound of the feeble ticking against his chest, by the intensity of his vampire kiss. How he loved the soothing rhythm of her heartbeat! He rested his cheek against her breast and trailed a lazy finger around an areola. He closed his eyes, then stiffened, jerking to his knees in mounting horror and despair._

_She looked peaceful; her inky eyelashes curling against the downy perfection of her cheekbones as if this were just anytime she'd dozed off after making love to her husband. She was breathtaking, his beautiful, beloved Beth, but she was white, as cold and white as the blood-flecked sheet beneath her._

.

...

_He recalled the aftermath with brutal clarity: his shaking hands puncturing the soft tissue on the inside of her elbow three times before finally mainlining the freshest stock he had into her vein; the frenzied drive to Josef's, tearing his wrist open again and again, only to slam the bones hard against his steering wheel, letting the wound heal every time, never sure whether it was courage or cowardice preventing him from releasing the vital fluid into her open mouth._

_He remembered standing there numbly as an IV was punched directly into her collapsing veins and she was bundled away, swaddled in blankets and surrounded by strangers._

_The weeks that passed after that were still a blur. He was told that during her coma he'd descended into delirium himself, never eating, never restin[/i][i]g, remaining at her bedside twenty-four hours a day through force of will alone. There was a dim memory of his haze clearing one day to find that an IV was being attached to the hollow of his own elbow and that Josef was carrying him into his freezer, cradling him within the crook of his arms and chiding him gently for his self-abuse._

_When the damage to his body had finally healed, Beth had already been gone for more than a week._

.

...

Josef's voice was matter of fact.

I didn't want you to see, to know how broken she was, Mick. I thought it was better, better that you think she left hating you for being the monster you always claimed to be than that you'd damaged her beyond all comprehension. Perhaps until the day she died.

Josef's voice rose in anger for the first time.

_Damned_ if I was going to stand by and let you condemn yourself for the rest of your eternal life simply for being true to your nature. You'd accept the fact that she left you, hell you'd even agree with it, as long as you thought she was fine. But this? I knew you'd never forgive yourself if she didn't recover.

Everything Josef was saying was true. His remorse would have driven him to actions that would have made things worse. He would never have left her, never have trusted her recovery to fate then. She meant too much to him. The day they married, his patience, his restraint in relation to Beth had vanished in all bar the one respect that had ultimately ended their relationship. During their marriage, she may only have given her blood that once, but her spirit had nourished him every day since in a way he'd come to rely on, to need. He wouldn't have had the strength to wait and watch from the shadows then, even if it meant condemning her to her new identity forever.

And if he'd been responsible for that too, well, if that happened Mick knew without a doubt the time would come when the sky would darken with a sunset he would never see.

He felt exhausted, his body so depleted of energy his voice sounded ancient, even to his own ears.

You say that forcing things could keep her from me forever? Well, she's seen me, Josef. What hope now?

Josef sighed.

I guess it's up to you, Mick, and to what you believe real love is. You can choose to make yourself a part of her new life, watching over her, hoping your presence will help to restore her to herself without causing any further damage, or you can walk away and wait for her to recover, giving her unconscious the time it needs to decide what's right for her, respecting the life she has to live, safe from the temptation that nearly killed her.

The squeak of a bedspring sounded from the other room. He didn't have much time. His head was pounding and he knew he needed to choose and soon, but his world was tilting at crazy angles, making it impossible to think straight. He had no lucid sense of direction anymore. Beth had always been his compass. He rested a hand against the wall, massaging his temple between thumb and forefinger. He was dizzy, his reflection demonic in the dark hallway mirror ahead of him. Behind him in her room, his light, the half that for so long had made him whole, was lying uneasily in her bed, perhaps sensing the presence that had watched over her for a lifetime. Even now he could feel her blood singing in his veins, those delicate ruby threads mingling and interweaving with his own, sewing her so deeply beneath his skin that he knew he would carry her with him always, bound together for eternity. Yes, he'd hurt her, God help him, he had. Could he not also save her? She was a part of him and he a part of her. She needed him. How could he leave her?

The pounding in his head was louder now, and he raised his head, the vision of the balcony he'd entered through blurred by tears. It was his route back to obscurity, to watching her from the shadows, seeing her live her life without him, perhaps loving another man, bearing children. A swift departure now would provide her with safety and lifelong peace of mind. If he continued his role as her silent protector, never again would the presence of vampires be revealed to her, he would see to that. Never again would she be tempted to put herself at risk by placing her trust in someone so mistakenly. She deserved to live the life he would have wanted for her had she never met him.

In his heart he knew, knew that even from shadows his very presence exposed her to further peril. He couldn't predict when she might glimpse him, how much harm that may cause her fragile state of mind. How could he possibly stay, even hidden as he had been? She had looked after herself without him. Was making a life for herself without him. How could he impose himself on her new life when he was the one who almost ended it?

Stay. Go. Go. Stay. There was nothing now but the pounding, the relentless pounding, and it filled the tiny apartment. The apartment. He'd forgotten it was so close to shore. It was the sea, the ceaseless sea, the muted thunder of the breaking waves, the rhythm never stopping, never faltering, rolling on from this moment to the end of days. He leaned his body against the window frame and gazed wearily out and across the water, searching for a sign.

And then he saw it, and knew without a doubt. There along the darkened horizon was the amber glimmer of the breaking dawn. He stood up and straightened his shoulders, determination shining from his eyes. It would be tough, but he could stand it.

For as long as the waves rolled in to shore, and for as long as the sun rose and set, he could stand it.

.

.

...

**A/N:** _A psychogenic fugue is a genuine psychiatric condition. See below:_

_.com/2007/04/18/the-dissociative-fugue-state-forgetting-ones-own-identity/_

.


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